50,000 farmers now on Delhi’s borders

Fifteen days since they started assembling, there are more than 50,000 farmers now sitting on the two major highways linking the national capital with the rest of the country at the Singhu and Tikri borders, estimate security agencies.

With no end in sight for the impasse over the new farm laws, that number is set to swell. On Friday, more farmer groups started heading to Delhi from Punjab and other parts of North India, ahead of a nation-wide sit-in protest on December 14 called by farmer organisations.

ET spoke to several farmer leaders who elucidated on their “Ghera Dalo, Dera Dalo (surround and sit-in) strategy”, and expressed confidence that they have the upper hand in the faceoff, as they feel the government is out of options to send them back or evict them by force. The leaders said they have appealed to families in Punjab to send at least one member to the protest outside the capital.


At Singhu, the protestors have occupied a nearly 10km stretch from the Delhi border till the turn for the Western Peripheral Expressway on NH-44. The sight is similar on the Tikri border on NH-9 as well.

On the Singhu and Tikri borders, which are the main protest sites, the arrangements are elaborate and the activities are managed with precision. The leaders said their focus is on keeping discipline and ensuring peaceful protest.

Food — from machine-made rotis and sabzi-dal (vegetables and pulses) to jalebis, pakoras, golgappas, fruits and dry-fruits — is available nearly round the clock for the thousands assembled. Solar set-ups have come up to charge mobile phones, while quilts, mosquito repellent creams, and warm socks and shoes to fight the cold, are being brought in. Even a library and make-shift gym at the Singhu border have come up .

Food and other supplies are being brought to the protest sites in tractor-trollies from villages in Punjab and Haryana, with the Sonipat Police allowing them passage on NH-44.

Farmers told ET that before starting for Delhi, they had stocked up supplies in their trucks and tractor-trollies. “We packed in enough to last us at least six months. People back in our villages donated pulses, vegetables, sugar, rice, fruits and oil along with cash, which helped us set up tents and run langars (community kitchens),” farmer leader Balbir Singh Rajewal said.

There have been a dozen deaths at these protest sites due to the cold and heart-attacks, but farmers said they were built of sterner stuff and prepared to sit-in through the winter.

“Back home, we bathe in cold water in tube-wells and water our fields at night. Cold does not worry us. We sow and wait for harvest. So, we have lots of patience too,” Rajewal said.

A sarpanch has come from a Punjab village to return two awards given to their village by the Centre, along with the Rs 18 lakh reward.

The main focus of the farmer groups is on peaceful protests, and deny any opportunity to the government to paint the protest as a one propped up by radical elements.

When some organisations put up photographs of jailed activists like Umar Khalid and Sharjeel Imam at the Tikri border on Thursday, farmer leader Darshan Pal was quick to clarify that it was probably done because of Human Rights Day on December 10 and that their protest was focussed on the farmer issue.

Meanwhile, the Delhi Police lodged an FIR against the farmers at the Singhu border on Thursday for violation of social distancing rules under the Covid-19 protocol, which some farmer leaders saw as building ground for evicting them from there. Pal said it was the government which was “stretching the protest by satisfying its ego and not repealing the three farm laws”.

With farmers now threatening to completely cut off Delhi by blocking all borders, the government seems to be running out of choices with its appeals to farmers to return home not cutting any ice and economic activity suffering due to the protest, as well as the inconvenience posed to Delhi-NCR residents.

Rajewal cautioned the government from acting rashly by attempting any exercise of force to evict them.

“We will never turn violent. This is a peaceful protest and our democratic right,” he said. “Our brotherhood is strong here. Let the Prime Minister come and talk to us.”